


You're Around (Till You're Not Around)

by lakesandquarries



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Gen, i love 2 suffer, magnequin, pure angst, spoilers thru ep 57, this is just straight up angst, written like two weeks ago and finally being posted
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-10
Updated: 2017-03-10
Packaged: 2018-10-02 04:07:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10209281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lakesandquarries/pseuds/lakesandquarries
Summary: Magnus can't feel. Taako pretends not to.(Takes place near the end of episode 57, when thb is camping. Lots of spoilers.)





	

He can't feel the fire. 

Magnus can't feel a lot of things now, to be fair, but something about not feeling the warmth is especially bad. He doesn't feel cold, either. He doesn't feel the breeze or the fire or the air or the grass beneath him. He doesn't feel anything. Hollow, maybe. Wooden and hollow and empty and blank. 

He’s been in this body less than a day, and already he hates it. He can’t feel, can’t eat, can’t protect his friends, can barely  _ sleep. _ They've been camped for an hour and still he's awake, remnants of visions clinging to his mind.

Two suns. Purple sky. Nothing else unusual, but -  _ two suns.  _

Was it warmer, there? Was it like a perpetual midsummer day? Was the world in a constant state of heat and light and fire? Other things must have been different, beyond the suns, beyond the sky. Was the ocean purple too? Why can’t he remember? 

Was he happy? How did he end up here

He scoots himself closer to the fire, holding his hand up, pretending he can feel the warmth. 

Will he ever actually die? He wishes he could shut his eyes, block out the emotions and thoughts he’s having, but his mannequin face is blank. He doesn’t even know  _ how _ he’s seeing. Is he dead, now? How many times has he died? How long will it be until he can see Julia again,  _ if _ he ever gets to see her again? Would she even recognize him?

And, the worst thought, the one he’s been pushing out of his mind as hard as he can: Was Julia even real? Is  _ he _ even real?

Nothing seems real, right now. He moves his left hand closer to the fire, slowly, tentatively, inching it further and further, until his pinky catches fire. 

He doesn't feel it. The wood burns and turns to ash and crumbles and still he doesn't feel it. When the fire starts to creep up to the rest of his hand, he shoves it into the dirt, until every sign and spark is gone, and he doesn't feel that either. 

A desert, a cup, two people. Jack and June, he can assume. The Temporal Chalice. He was the visitor that brought Jack and June, wasn’t he? He’s known that, or been sort of vaguely aware of the concept of it but unable to actually coherently think about it, since they got home from Refuge.

Home, he thinks. Is the Bureau really home anymore? Can they ever go back? The Director will be furious when she learns what’s happened,  _ if _ she learns what happened. Can he even trust her?

Can he trust  _ anyone? _

He’d like to think he can trust Taako and Merle. He loves them, after all. Not the way he loved -  _ loves _ \- Julia, but it’s still love. Taako had thrown himself into the void to save him, and what else could that be considered? And Merle - well. Merle may be grumpy and gruff, but he’d have walked out long ago if he really wanted to. But he’s still here, and he’d pulled them back from the void.

They love each other. But  _ trust? _ Trust is hard. Trusting them means telling them about his life before. Trust means telling them about a little dog and an angry crowd, about hands twice the size of Magnus’ teaching him to turn wood into art, about a beautiful girl who grew into a beautiful woman, about a mad and vicious governor and the rebellion that stopped him, about showing mercy to his worst enemy, about a hand carved gazebo and the words  _ “I do” _ and that brief period of bliss.

It means telling them about leaving. About coming home to find it  _ gone _ . About finding bodies and barely being able to recognize them. About the way he wakes up some mornings and turns to her only to remember she’s gone. 

How does he put that into words? How does he explain the empty pit that opens up in his chest every time he thinks of Raven’s Roost?

And, with what he's seen since being dragged back from the void by Taako, how does he even know it's  _ real? _

A desert. A red jacket. A cup. 

Who is he?

If he wasn't in this awful shitty wooden excuse for a body, he thinks he'd be crying. As it is, he's making these awful noises, somewhere between a sob and a gasp, and he can't even cover his mouth because of this stupid awful mannequin body. 

“Yo,” he hears, and then he turns to see Taako, rubbing his eye and sitting up slightly, chest just barely poking out of the ridiculous sleep sack he insists on using. 

The glamour he was using earlier was gone, and now Magnus really notices the differences in his appearance. The bags under his eyes are heavy, his hair’s lost some of its shine, even his nose seems… _ less _ , somehow. Taako, but slightly to the left. Not unrecognizable, but…unsettling, almost.

“Mags?” Taako says, sitting up fully now. “Might be the new face, or lack thereof, but, uh, you’re kinda staring.”

“Oh,” Magnus says, turning his gaze to the ground. “Right.”

“Are…you okay?” Taako asks, spinning a few strands of blonde hair, not looking at Magnus. 

Magnus stares at him. 

“Jeez, it's just a question,” Taako says, rolling his eyes, but then he looks back at Magnus and he can see the faintest glimmer of worry in his eyes. 

“I - I don't know?” Magnus says, finally. “I don't - this whole thing is just -” he waves his hands, unable to find the words. Taako stands, walking over so he’s standing in front of Magnus.

“It blows,” Taako finishes for him. 

Magnus droops. “Yeah. How're…how’re you holding up?”

Taako waves his hand. “You know me. Taako’s good out here, right?” He grins. It doesn’t reach his eyes.

Magnus doesn’t comment. Taako’s never the type to share, and it’s been a long day. Pushing him will just make him shut down more. 

“We'll,” Taako starts, then stops. Pauses. Stares off into the distance and thinks. “...Shit’s fucked,” he says, finally, sitting down next to Magnus. 

“Yeah,” Magnus says. Taako looks at him, scrutinizing him almost. 

“We should draw you a face.”

“Draw me a face,” Magnus repeats. 

“Yeah. Like, no offense, but the whole “faceless mannequin” thing is kiiiinda creepy.” He leans forward and plucks a stick of charcoal out of the fire, then turns to Magnus and raises an eyebrow. 

“Why not,” Magnus says. 

He doesn't feel Taako drawing. But he watches as Taako draws, and he can almost imagine what it'd feel like. Taako is focused, the kind of serious, deep focus Magnus almost never sees from him. He's got his tongue sticking out a bit, reminding Magnus of a cat. 

It hits him again how different Taako looks. Like some of the inherent  _ Taako-ness _ of his face has been drained away. This close, he can also see Taako seems a little less healthy, too. His skin is desaturated, missing its usual vibrance. Even his eyes seem duller. 

Taako used to glow. It's not that he's ugly now, just…

He’s lost his glow. 

“Done!” Taako announces, stepping back, then frowning and stepping closer. “Hold up. Can you kneel down for me? Yeah, perfect.” He draws a few more quick lines, then looks over Magnus and gives and approving nod. He darts over to his pack, grabbing a small mirror from inside. “Check it,” he says, grinning at Magnus and handing him the mirror.

It’s…well. If Magnus is being totally honest, it’s not very good. The eyes are crudely drawn circles with little lines to represent eyebrows, the nose is just a triangle, and the mouth is just a single line.

But there’s a little line, right through Magnus’s eye, like the scar he got in that bar fight so long ago. There’s more scribbles on the side of his face, and the top of his head, almost like sideburns and hair.

Magnus looks up. Taako’s watching him, biting his lip, fidgeting with his hands, spinning one of his rings around his finger.

“So?” he asks.

“It’s perfect,” Magnus says. Taako snorts, rolls his eyes. But he looks away and Magnus sees the faintest hint of a glow in his eyes..

“I wouldn’t go that far, homie. But I’m glad you like it.” He flashes Magnus another grin - one that almost reaches his eyes, this time - before taking the mirror and putting it away. Magnus looks down at his hands, at the grass, and thinks.

“Taako?” he says, after a moment of silence. 

“Yeah?” Taako says, glancing up at him. He’s crawled back into his sleep sack, face just poking out.

“Thanks.”

“Yeah,” Taako says. “Things’ll be okay, right? We’ll figure something out. We always do.” He smiles at Magnus. Not his usual snarky grins, but…a comforting smile. Or the closest Taako can get, at least. 

“Yeah,” Magnus says, but he doesn’t believe it. 

“Get some sleep, dude. Want me to cast sleep on you?”

He shakes his head. “No, no. I’m fine.”

“If you insist.” Within a few seconds Taako is snoring. Magnus sighs, lies down on the ground, tries to get comfortable.

Realizes that being comfortable isn’t possible anymore. Sighs again. Looks up at the sky, the stars. Thinks about a different sky, with different stars.

Sleep, he reminds himself. Everything will be better in the morning. 

(It’s not.)

**Author's Note:**

> I started writing this two weeks ago and then completely forgot about it whoops
> 
> Crossposted on tumblr at [lakesandquarries.tumblr.com](http://lakesandquarries.tumblr.com/). i post memes and taz and other stuff. pls follow and/or message me!
> 
> title from ["older and taller"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zB3fwHX83k) by regina spektor. 
> 
> Also, fun fact: I rolled some dice while writing this.  
> \- taako rolled an 18 in waking up and 20 in noticing magnus crying  
> \- rolled 12 in comforting  
> \- magnus rolled 12 in being comforted  
> \- taako rolled 5 in drawing magnus a face and 15 in details  
> \- magnus rolled a 15 in falling asleep


End file.
